Decoding Zhao Changpeng's "advocate": How to predict the next selected Binance system portfolio?

Author: Tyler

How much energy can a tweet have?

The answer is: to instantly increase a token with a circulating market value of over 200 million dollars by 60%.

This is CZ's influence. On September 24, CZ retweeted SafePal's tweet about the native integration of Aster, adding, “SafePal is also part of our portfolio, invested early, right after Trust Wallet,” and the price of SFP surged in response.

This is not an isolated case; in addition to the eye-catching Aster, CZ has recently mentioned several projects invested in by YZi Labs (formerly Binance Labs), all of which have generated significant hype.

If you put these portfolios together, you will actually find that there is a very clear main line underlying them.

1. The correct way to open the investment landscape of Binance.

「SafePal is also a portfolio, btw. Invested way back.」

CZ's statement has also led many people to summarize a straightforward screening method, which is to examine the token projects that YZi Labs has previously invested in; this is likely to uncover the next skyrocketing asset.

This logic sounds correct, but in practice, it's like “finding a needle in a haystack” for a very simple reason - Binance's investment landscape is extremely vast.

First, we need to understand Binance's investment logic. The full acquisition of Trust Wallet in July 2018 marked the starting point for Binance's investment landscape expansion, signifying its strategic evolution from a single CEX to an ecological matrix. Since then, Binance has gradually formed three major “investment levers” that cover the entire project lifecycle:

Incubator Model (MVB, YZi Labs Incubation Plan): A broad net approach to cover a large number of startup teams and early potential projects, ultimately selecting and investing in a few projects, with relatively small amounts, mainly focusing on incubation from 0 to 1;

YZi Labs (Direct VC Investment): Targeting more mature growth-stage projects, with higher precision and larger investment amounts, aimed at providing in-depth resource integration;

Exchange listed tokens (Alpha token listing or new coin launch): Focus on mature projects, providing top-tier liquidity and market exposure;

It is precisely through the combination of these three paths that Binance has almost encompassed project layouts at different stages and in different tracks, achieving a staggered layout that covers the entire lifecycle of different projects (early incubation, investment support, and listing trading), among which, the direct investment by YZi Labs is the core of the mid-to-early stage ecosystem construction.

But the problem is that, according to third-party statistics from the data platform Messari, YZi Labs (Binance Labs) has invested in (or laid out) over 300 projects since its establishment. Clearly, using “having been invested in” as a screening criterion is essentially equivalent to fishing with your eyes closed, which is meaningless.

So, what is the real screening logic?

Based on the recent mentions by CZ of the three cases Aster, Sign, and SafePal, some commonalities can already be identified, all meeting several core characteristics:

First, there is a high degree of ecological synergy with Binance: for example, Aster, as a prep DEX, completes the on-chain derivatives puzzle and alleviates the pressure on Hyperliquid, while SafePal, through its integration strategy closely aligned with Binance's product line, naturally achieves ecological complementarity between “custodial CEX & non-custodial wallets”;

Secondly, there should be a clear and continuous implementation rhythm: whether it is Aster (2021), Sign (2020), or SafePal (2018), these projects are not new stars, but “veterans” that have persisted from 2018 to 2021, continuously iterating and expanding during the long cycle;

This is exactly the key to interpreting CZ's calling logic.

2. Searching for a horse by its picture, CZ's “shouting order” logic

If we carefully review CZ's activities over the past few months, we will find that his “calls” are not made on a whim; in fact, it can be said that they are intentional. Analyzing the timeline, we can clearly see a logically coherent and progressively layered thread.

On June 14, CZ addressed the community's concerns about his “shouting order Aster” and specifically mentioned a number of invested projects, including Vana, OneKey, Sign, Aster, etc., laying the groundwork;

From June to September, CZ has repeatedly mentioned or interacted with Aster, continuously injecting attention into it;

On September 23, CZ specifically retweeted Sign, emphasizing its identity as part of the YZi Labs portfolio and revealing that he personally facilitated its connections.

On September 24th, it was SafePal's turn. CZ not only mentioned it but also specifically emphasized the early and strategic nature of the investment—“Invested very early, right after Trust Wallet.”

Aster, Sign, SafePal, Vana, OneKey, without exception, are all portfolio ecosystem projects that can deeply collaborate with Binance's main business and deliver a “combined punch.”

This indicates that CZ's “shouting orders” is by no means random, but rather a conscious effort to guide the market's attention back to those “old-school pragmatists” that are deeply tied to the Binance ecosystem.

Taking SafePal as an example, understanding its multiple identities within the Binance ecosystem will help you grasp the intricacies behind these “shouting orders.”

In Binance's wallet layout, many people may be more familiar with the earlier Trust Wallet or OneKey, which just received investment this year. To some extent, Trust Wallet was acquired halfway through by an old team, OneKey belongs to a new investment darling, while SafePal is the first truly from-scratch (hardware) wallet project that Binance has invested in and incubated.

In September 2018, Binance had just acquired Trust Wallet and immediately included SafePal as the only wallet brand in the first incubation program of Binance Labs, completing the investment by the end of the year, while SafePal officially launched its first hardware wallet S1 in the first half of the following year.

In other words, before the product was officially launched, SafePal was already seen by Binance as an important player in the hardware wallet space. Because of this, in the context where Binance has never developed its own hardware wallet, SafePal remains the most strategically significant and deeply integrated hardware wallet option in its ecosystem.

In addition to hardware, its App wallet has almost become an extension terminal of the Binance product matrix, nearly replicating core trading and asset management functions:

CEX Layer: A small app integrates Binance's spot, leverage, contract, and wealth management entry points, which can serve as a backup for the core trading & asset management functions of the main site. The Binance App can be directly invoked within the App to complete authorization login and trading.

Trading Layer: Swap (supports direct use of liquidity from Binance main site), natively supports BNB Chain and Aster, transfers of BNB Chain stablecoins free of Gas;

Asset Management Layer: Wealth Management (natively supports Binance Earn), NFT, and DeFi modules are directly connected to the BNB Chain ecosystem.

Fiat deposit layer: Integrated with Binance's Binance Connect fiat deposit and withdrawal channel, built-in fiat purchase and U payment support;

Transfer Layer: You can directly invoke the Binance App to complete the transfer on the currency details page within the App, without the need to copy and paste the wallet address.

Note: SafePal Wallet's Binance Mini Program

Many old investors should have an impression that during Binance's inspection of users from certain countries/regions in 2021, the combination of SafePal + Binance DApp became a “safe haven” for many users. This deeply bound cooperative relationship is likely one of the core reasons why CZ specifically mentioned SafePal.

Therefore, when we pull back this logical line, we will find that CZ's calls are not just casual remarks; they are not simply about the projects being invested in. What they actually point to are “ecological puzzle” projects that can synergistically work with the core product matrix of Binance.

3. Value Reassessment: Becoming a Filtering Game of the “Ecological Puzzle”

So why is the value of these 'ecological puzzles' worth being reassessed by the market?

First of all, they are all a补充 to the gaps in the Binance ecosystem:

Aster is an important move by Binance in the on-chain derivatives sector, designed to respond to the competitive landscape between CEX/DEX, and to balance emerging rivals like Hyperliquid.

Sign card position RWA narrative, laying a key foreshadowing for Binance in the emerging on-chain RWA market;

SafePal provides dual access through hardware and the App, covering Binance's core trading and asset management scenarios, becoming the non-custodial wallet portfolio that is closest to its main business.

They are not short-term narrative products that follow trends in their respective tracks, but rather exist as functional plugins in the Binance ecosystem, serving as an irreplaceable part of its strategic puzzle to some extent.

Secondly, these projects demonstrate the resilience of long-termism, having gone through complete bull and bear cycles. Even when the market is cold, they continue to iterate and expand. It is this BUIDL spirit that allows their narratives to not rely on short-term emotions, but rather to continuously build a moat through product and ecosystem synergy.

It is precisely for this reason that the market value of these projects often misaligns severely with their actual ecological niche, and CZ's calls are often an external catalyst that prompts the market to begin reassessing their true value.

There is also a particularly persuasive special signal that many people have overlooked: SafePal itself was an early investor in APX Finance (the predecessor of Aster), and the fact that this was retweeted by CZ is precisely because SafePal is launching as “the first natively integrated wallet with Aster.”

This is a very interesting trend, indicating that CZ also recognizes the synergy between high-quality “sub-projects” within the Binance ecosystem, forming a matrix effect of “1+1>2.”

In addition, a significant move by SafePal this year is the deep integration with the compliant Swiss bank Fiat24, allowing users to open bank accounts directly within the wallet and apply for a Mastercard, thus facilitating a convenient channel for crypto assets to enter everyday consumption (further reading “Using U for Consumption, A Step-by-Step Guide to Registering and Using the SafePal Mastercard”).

From investment to use cases, this is the best annotation of the ecological puzzle value that CZ refers to.

Written at the end

In other words, the real selection logic behind CZ's “call order” Binance portfolio is that you not only have to be able to “survive” in a bear market but also actively prove that you can expand and capture new value within the large ecosystem of Binance.

Therefore, predicting the next lucky one to be named is essentially about finding complementary factors to the Binance ecosystem that are truly worth paying attention to.